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Hello, reader! It’s that time again where we reflect on the hot beautiful summer we spent at work and nowhere else. I didn’t make it anywhere this summer, and I’m actually taking my first trip to the beach this summer. It’s August, but I’m trying. My nails aren’t too summery, but I like how they turned out. I’m wearing Model City Polish‘s Awaken to Spring over a gradient of Literary Lacquers‘s Little Sleep Song and Sweet Heart Polish‘s Summer Breeze.

When I first started planning this look, I was just going to do a base of Summer Breeze. It’s a very dainty shade of blue, and has a smattering of holo; it would have been the perfect undies on its own. At the last minute, I decided to go for the gradient. It’s very subtle; you can hardly tell it’s there, but that’s the look I wanted.

Awaken to Spring is a beautiful glitter topper with rose, aqua, and copper glitters. I love the sparkle in this; it’s colorful but still kind of subdued. It’s perfect over this gradient.

It’s a new week, and I have some new nails. I was short on time this week and did this mani in two stages; the base color, and the stamping. That’s why my edges are a little rough-looking. I used Nails Inc.’s Sweets Way as my base, and a white creme I whipped up myself to stamp with.

Sweets Way is a white crelly with some colorful glitters, and I knew it wouldn’t need a lot to go with it. I nearly just wore it alone, and I did for a day or so. I decided that no, I could do better, so I did some quick stamping with my white creme. My stamping isn’t perfect, it never is, but I like the look I got. It’s like lace, just a simple little sweet something.

Sweets Way was discontinued by Nails Inc.; Nails Inc. can be found at Sephora.

I bought this polish myself.

Hi! So it’s been a minute since I posted last. I hit a busy spell at work, on top of my other projects, blogging was the thing that fell to the wayside. I have no idea how you girls with full-time jobs and children keep your blogs going so regularly! As you can see, a lot has happened to my nails since my last post. I broke a nail at work (rip) and had to cut them all down. That was a couple weeks ago. They were once shorter than this. So, to celebrate my return, here’s some nails! I used Sinful Colors’s Love Nails and Wacie Nail Company’s Wintrella.

Love Nails is an old Sinful Classic. I didn’t capture it so well in these photos, but it has this icy blue glow to it that’s absolutely beautiful. One downside is that it’s kind of on the sheer side; I’m wearing three coats here and my visible nail lines were only just covered. Regardless, it’s a polish I’ve had for years, and I love digging oldies out of the vault.

Wintrella is a glitter topper I made myself! It was one of my early attempts at polish making, and is essentially every blue and silver glitter I had at my disposal. I love icy glitters on icy blue, and this is a look that could work in the fall just as well as the summer.

Love Nails might have been discontinued by Sinful Colors; other SC polishes are sold in stores. I have four bottles of Wintrella, let me know if you want one!

I bought Love Nails myself.
I made Wintrella.

Hi, reader! My look this week is a classic gradient with glitter over it. For the gradient, I used K*Sea Gale’s Nails‘s Wisdom and KBShimmer‘s Excuse Me, I’m VIPurple; the glitter is Sinful Colors’s I Miss You.

So this is a look I love to do when I know I’m using a glitter topper. The gradient adds a little bit of complexity to the base. There’s nothing wrong with a solid base and glitter, because that’s a great look, too. I like the gradient because it’s a really subtle effect.

Widsom and Excuse Me, I’m VIPurple were both holos, and in the photos, you can’t really even tell. The glitter completely obscures the holo effect. That was a little disappointing, but the glitter is able to stand out, and that’s what’s really important to me. It’s a simple look, but there’s still something going on.

K*Sea Gale’s Nails is now Northern Nail Polish; Wisdom is still available on their website. Excuse Me, I’m VIPurple was an Indie Shop Atlanta 2017 VIP exclusive; other KBShimmer polishes can be found on their website. I Miss You was discontinued by Sinful Colors; other Sinful Colors polishes are sold in stores.

Welcome back, reader! I’ve been slacking on my swatches, but I’m still working on them. Today I have a glitter topper someone once told me was “terrifying” because it looked difficult to remove. This is Demolition from Formula X for Sephora; I’m wearing one thick coat (basically two) over Marc Jacobs Beauty’s Shocking (pink), Butter London’s Tea and Toast (taupe), Blue-Eyed Girl Lacquer‘s Lighthouse by the Lake (blue), a nameless vintage Maybelline (brown), and Sally Hansen’s Sun Kissed (orange).

Demolition is a clear-based glitter topper; the glitters are hexes of various sizes and pastel shades, which focuses largely on pastel pink. Application was good; the polish consistency is a little on the thick side, which is necessary to carry these chunky glitters. It dries quickly, though, and with a somewhat textured finish; top coat is definitely required for a smooth-to-the-touch finish.

I know these chunky glitters have fallen out of style, but I am still about them. I was super excited to find a polish like this from a mainstream brand as well; they had several color variations on this formula and I bought several of them. It wears pretty well despite being on the thicker side; a lot of heavy glitter toppers like these are quick to chip, but not this one. My only real complaint is that it takes quite a bit of top coat to smooth it down.

Hello, reader! Welcome back to the blog! I’ve got a pretty basic glitter look this week, and it’s one I’m really into. Neons and glitter are pretty much my whole summer, and I’m ready to get it started. For this look, I used Blue-Eyed Girl Lacquer‘s Look at These Assholes and Lynnderella‘s Are You Bouquet?.

Let me preface this by saying that my camera did not want to cooperate with the neonness of Look at These Assholes. At all. I did some color correction and got it pretty accurate, which in turn makes my skin look a little weird, but I’ll take it. This is a deliciously bright neon.

NEON

Are You Bouquet? actually watered it down a little. Even though it’s a glitter topper, it’s in a slightly milky white base. I’m a huge fan of white glitter toppers, and I love this one in particular for the random pops of color. Also, you can’t really tell, but I used a matte top coat over this to highlight the iridescent glitters in there too.

Look at These Assholes has been discontinued by Blue-Eyed Girl Lacquer; other BEGLs are available in their online shop. Are You Bouquet? was a limited edition from Lynnderella; other Lynns are sold on their website, eBay, and Amazon.

Welcome back, reader! Today, I have the last of Bee’s Knees Lacquer‘s Walking Dead trio from The Indie Shop Atlanta. This one is called Cozy In There?; again, I have no idea what this is a reference to. I’m wearing three coats of Cozy in There? with one coat of Seche Vite.

Cozy in There? is a pale cool nude with a golden shimmer, multichrome flakies, and a little bit of holo. As is true with all of the Bee’s Knees I’ve worn so far, this one is an absolute dream to apply and use. This one needed two coats for full opacity, but everything else is spot-on; the product consistency is perfect and is very easy to apply. It dries with a smooth, glossy finish.

I love this polish. The nude base is merely a vehicle for all the other good stuff in here; the multichrome flakes lend a colorful finish to the polish, and the shimmer and holo add dimension and complexity. Something that’s true for this polish, and the trio as a whole, is that all the colors are oddly safe for work; RIP Nameless Horse is probably the boldest of the three, but they’re all nice neutrals with lots of fun additions. I feel fortunate that I was able to snag these for myself (and a couple other people!).

Cozy in There? was an Indie Shop Atlanta event exclusive; other Bee’s Knees Lacquers are sold on their website.

I bought this polish myself.

Welcome back! I’ve got a green look to show you this week for Manicure Tuesday. The striping tape wasn’t on my side, but I’m happy with the look I got. I used Philly Loves Lacquer’s Fortunate Rainbow and Elevation Polish‘s Yeti’s Healing Vibes.

I always feel a little sad talking about a brand that’s closed down. When I got into indie polish, PhLL was one of the brands I saw everywhere, and it took me ages to try them; I only have box-exclusive polishes from them, and never bought any of their core releases. That said, it was a huge shock to me when they closed up. I love every PhLL polish I have, and I regret that I didn’t go for more of them.

This Elevation Polish was a limited edition made to benefit the American Himalayan Foundation after the devastating earthquakes in Nepal in 2015. It’s a beautiful creamy jade with fine little rainbow flakies in it. It’s gorgeous! I know Elevation is a controversial brand now, but this is one polish from them I’m really glad I bought.

Both of these polishes are limited editions that have since sold out. Philly Loves Lacquer no longer makes polish. Elevation Polishes are sold in their online store.

Another day, another swatch! This blogging from Starbucks thing is really working for me! I don’t know why I didn’t think to do this sooner. For today’s swatch, I have Bee’s Knees Lacquer‘s Don’t Open Dead Inside, which is another Indie Shop Atlanta event exclusive. I’m wearing three coats with one coat of Seche Vite top coat.

I always read this as Don’t Dead Open Inside.

Don’t Open Dead Inside is a cool-toned brown polish with a strong green-to-gold shifting shimmer, iridescent flakies, and a smattering of holo. Application was great with this polish; I had an opaque first coat, and only used additional coats because I like the thickness of it. The polish dries with a glossy finish; I used top coat for shine and protection.

I have to say, I really dig this polish. I love the zombie-chic aesthetic it goes for, because it does it really well. It’s something unique in my collection; I don’t have anything like this. I also appreciate the kitchen sink approach to this polish, and this applies to all of the Bee’s Knees Atlanta exclusives; they’re so multi-faceted and complex. Zombie nails never looked so good!

Don’t Open Dead Inside was an Indie Shop Atlanta event exclusive; other Bee’s Knees Lacquers are sold on their website.

I bought this polish myself.

Welcome back to Manicure Monday! Full disclosure, I’m not super happy with these photos, but because I love how this marble turned out, I’m posting it. It’s been raining here for a week straight, and even though I was in the middle of washing dishes, I had to take advantage of a brief moment of sunshine. My nails are wet and flat here, the tips of the nails are all chewed up-looking because I didn’t do a great job trimming, but I’m happy enough with the result to post it. My polishes are Enchanted Polish‘s October 2014 and Blue-Eyed Girl Lacquer‘s Niagara Sunrise.

I paired these two because they both have a strong and warm shimmer that complements the other. October 2014 has this lovely olive shift, where Niagara Sunrise’s is a soft but fiery orange. October 2014 also benefits from being a holo. These two have so much dimension on their own, and some of that gets lost in this marble, but I’m happy with how it turned out.

I did a dry marble for this. I poured a thin stripe of each polish onto a Ziploc bag, marbled them together with a dotting tool, then let it dry overnight. I tweaked the drip marble method a bit; as cool as drip marbles are, I feel like marbling it with a tool gives me more control over the way the colors mix. By the time I’ve gotten what I want with a drip marble, the colors are so blended together I can’t tell them apart.

Enchanted Polishes are sold on their website. Blue-Eyed Girl Lacquers are sold in their online store.